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But first, a batch of flower-boxes that I whipped up (matboard, and tiny faux flowers from Hobby Lobby): That pedestal-looking thingie on the right goes into the attic to support the roof. Speaking of roof, I've been shingling the roof and gable (octagon and fishscale shingles from Ernie's; I guess I was expecting the really flat shingles that often come with the Greenleaf kits, but that's not what these are (Houseworks 7003 and 7005). They are thick, difficult to cut w/o cracking, and quite non-uniform in the case of the octagons. Half-way through I thought that well, the thickness was a good thing since they'd be less susceptible to warping, so I barreled along with the gluing and taping until I noticed that there was a big ol' mass buckle happening along the longest stretch; had to get creative with clamping, but seems to have addressed that issue. (Whew...) I am really having difficulties with estimations on this one! Got this far, and figured that I need three more bags of shingles! Missed Ernie's 25%-off sale by one day, but shingles are on their way... (On the balcony is how many shingles I have left right now!) I think it's time to move back inside and start picking out fabrics.

Got that porch railing finished up (except for touchups): Glued the three left roof pieces together as a unit, then glued onto 3rd floor: Here I am tidying up the battery box and its matboard cover, into which the wires will be stuffed: The right roof pieces, glued together (but not glued onto the left roof assembly yet). I ran out of music sheet paper, so I used some of the flooring paper on some of the roof pieces; then I ran out of that! Note to self...

Got those spindles and posts painted up this afternoon, like soldiers in rows: This shows the pins in the undersides of the spindles, and toothpicks for the newel posts: I decided to install the railing after all the posts were in, so as to make it easier to cut to fit. Nearing the end of the line, and (after searching about for a while and thinking about how much I'd used)-- four pieces of Houseworks 7020 railing is not quite enough for this house! Dug around in my wood scrap box and found a piece of railing of the same make that had been stained-- I'll give it an extra paint coat or two. . Whew, that was close!

Another time-consuming bit for the past while-- 1st floor porch railing: That little guy in the lower right is my replacement Hagen-Renaker bully, for the one which somebody *cough- hubby* broke while dusting or messing about; this little guy will stay in here with me safe from leg-breakers. I love Hagen-Renaker miniatures-- but the realistic ones, not the cartoon-y ones.

...I've seen worse first-coats of paint. First coat always looks the worst though. This is Valspar interior satin, a tint-match to the Valspar "Pristine Petal" that I used on my first pink Tennyson.

Was not looking forward to splicing wires-- found my last battery pack with long wires: Wish I could find more of them-- got them off Amazon a couple years back. Got rooms wired up, and staircase installed: Started on some siding: Starting to get there!

Dry-fit of staircase and landing railing looks good: Added a matboard back to staircase-- matboard is flexible enough that it went with the curve. Painted, sanded, repainted, spackled, repainted, gessoed staircase and it still looked terrible. Decided to rip off those photo-corners and wallpaper the thing, with matboard trim. Much better (after cutting out mirror image of wallpaper trace that I actually needed ): I got one of those battery boxes, though 17" may be a bit short for some of the runs (may have to do some splicing); you can see here where I had to un-install the bathroom tile flooring because I'd forgotten that I needed to lay a wire run here for the kitchen light below it. Good thing that plastic tiling peels right off! Installed the bay walls because I need to install the 3rd floor to start routing the wire-works: I love the matte yellow kitchen tile floor that I got from Ernie's.

Got the walls up, and flooring templates fit: Bannister-ing the staircase and the 2nd floor landing: I use cut-off sewing pins to help align (and maybe it adds a wee bit of sturdiness). Those dark details on the stair step sides are actually photo corners; I thought they'd add a bit of interest once painted.

I did manage to get bits and pieces done on the window+door prep over the holidays, despite travel and sickness and insane work schedules : Now all the windows and door(ways) are assembled, painted, and sealed. I believe I'm finally ready to start assembling the house structure! (That handle on the single door is a fixture that I found at Michael's or HL-- "Tim Holtz idea-logy" ring fastener. I thought that it looked like a nifty handle.)

This is a time-consuming bit-- framing out the windows. The pieces in the kit (simple frame pieces) were un-retrievable, as the die had not cut all the way through, so would have had to destroy them to extract them from the sheet. I opted for matboard framing, doubling up thickness on the exterior frame and the sills. It will look nicer anyway. Got the door frames prepped-- no, I won't leave that exposed cross-bar wood like it is! And yes, I realize that the windows don't have sashes or stiles. They are sash-less stile-less windows.

Got the primered pieces sanded and the wallpapers glued on; here are the papers that I've used so far (this is just in dry-fit): Have decided to use matboard framing for the windows instead of those old clod-sy pieces that come with the kit; prepped the matboard trim and now ready to start framing out the windows.

Did some Hobby Lobby shopping last weekend, got papers and woods and flowers and paints: Edit: and those two little pink fairy garden chairs: Got the foundation glued onto the 1st floor, and did some more priming; got the wallpapers sprayed with matte fixative (Mod Podge); also my 25%-off Black Friday from Ernie's came in so I have my siding, roof shingles (fish-scale shingles for gables are on back-order), dentil moulding and spindles. Time to prep some of these window walls: paper, then window frames. Goes much better if I do that before I assemble the structure.

My poor neglected Tennyson. I lost interest in this house. I walk by it everyday. Alysia was going to finish it but then she became a teenager. <sigh> I was looking at her today, wondering if the five minute room rescue would work on her. Maybe just working on the house will get her back in the zone.

Greetings, I bought the Tennyson kit in a garage sale. I have 2 young great granddaughters that I am planning to make very happy with this project. Also, my husband has been open to helping me learn how to build with wood. So this will be my first project and I'm excited!

It's been a long time since I dusted off the blog but as I begin a new journey with a Tennyson, it seemed like a good time to sweep out the cobwebs and record my progress as I go. The inspiration for this house is the book, "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin. There are two houses that are featured in the book: one is a sea side resort set on Grand Isle, Louisiana where the main character spends her summers. The second is a house in New Orleans that Edna rents when she discovers she needs a place to hide away and pursue her art. While the book is set in 1899, neither house is a traditional Victorian. In fact, the reason both figure so largely in the story is because they are different from the house of Edna's husband who is rather obsessed with possessions and grandeur. As soon as I saw the Tennyson, it resonated with me as an interpretation of how I feel about this book. I'm not going to be combining the two houses or trying to duplicate either of them.....it's more of a tone that represents the way the book makes me feel. I see it as light and airy, in sea side colors of sage green and creamy sand tones. I also chose to use monochromatic furniture throughout the house and bought up every piece of white wire wicker I could find. The pops of color will be in the art work, the accessories and knick knacks, and the textiles used for dressing the beds, chairs, and sofas--in other words, the focus will be on personality and creativity as the colors pull the eye to the things that represent individuality. The wallpaper echos the muted greens and ivory of the exterior and the floors will be hardwood stained golden oak. On the first floor will be two parlors, one formal for entertaining and one casual for general family use. The second floor will have two bedrooms, and the third floor attic will be one large room with a bedroom, a sitting area, and an art studio. I started the Tennyson four years ago, putting it into dry fit and filling it with all the furnishings right down to rugs on the floor and framed art for the walls. But a decline in my health brought it to a halt right there and the poor house remained in dry fit patiently awaiting my return. When we moved from Colorado to Arizona, I packed up the furnishings, took the house out of dry fit and moved it along with me. As soon as I got my studio unpacked here, I put the Tenny back into dry fit and refurnished it so I could play with it and be motivated to build again every time I saw it. In a lot of ways that house had helped me keep the faith that I would be able to return to the miniatures I love so much. This is how she's looked for the past four years: When I was able to start building again, I started with a little Loganberry to regain my equilibrium and once that was finished I knew I could handle the Tennyson. After looking at my original design plan I made some modifications to accommodate my current abilities but that was mainly to the wiring plan. I had originally intended on putting 36 lights into this house but I've scaled that back to a more manageable 8. With the exception of upgrading the doors and the two windows in the attic, I'll be doing a straight build with no bashing this time. I had planned on making my own porch and balcony railings but decided to go with the factory specs instead. The only other change was to the exterior color after Tracy posted this inspiration pic on Facebook and I fell in love with the sages and ivory. The Tennyson won't be a painted lady because I want to keep the lines simple and clean but I really like this palette. Today I started painting the porch railing pieces. Again. That was the only thing I had accomplished before I got too sick to build and they're painted the original hunter green I was going to work with. Painting them ivory has been a bit of a chore and it'll take about four coats to cover it, but I like to paint and have been getting into the Zone. I like to listen to audio books while I work and decided that "Dandelion Wine" by Ray Bradbury was a good place to start with this build. I'll try hard to keep up with this blog while I'm building altho I won't be able to post step by step instructions as I've done in the past and it may take a long time for me to finish since I'm not always physically able to get into the studio every day. Mainly this is just a way of sharing the joy of being back in the studio with my friends. It feels soooooooooooooooo good to be building again! I feel more like myself than I have in a very, very long time.